On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho San Antonio is a fast growing, fast moving community with something new happening every day.

That's why each week we go on the record with the news makers who are driving this change.

Then we gather at the Reporters Roundtable to talk about the latest news stories with the journalists behind those stories.

Join us now as we go on the.

Hi, everybody.

And thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

I'm Randy Beamer.

And this week we are starting with the sheriff.

Javier Salazar is going to talk about a number of issues, follow up with some when we talked to you the last time about.

First, though, I want to talk about the immigration town hall meeting that you had.

There was a little controversy over that.

It was sponsored by put on by the two Spanish language TV stations here in town.

And so it was in Spanish.

But you had some people say we're in America, speak English.

I've never heard a more ludicrous comment made.

But yeah, these are typically Facebook trolls.

That came out in living color and they were in the studio audience.

Look, at the end of the day, it was it was a forum that was important.

We need to keep this conversation about immigration going And typically, you've seen me do press events before where if the questions posed to me in Spanish, I answer it in Spanish.

If the questions posed to me in English, I answer it in English and I make no apologies for speaking two languages.

There were some folks in the studio audience that did not appreciate that.

And so, yeah, here it is, 20, 22.

And we're still hearing people say, this is America, speak English, even though it was Spanish TV, it was Spanish TV, it was Univision.

And Telemundo were gracious enough to host it for us along with UTSA.

It was a beautiful forum.

Again, it was a lot of conversation from some experts that I was blessed to be on stage with, and it was a good conversation.

We didn't really let the the, you know, the racist comments get to us.

We didn't let it disrupt our purpose for being there was to have a good, strong conversation about immigration.

Speaking of immigration and conversations, you talk to the White House, you had sent them three letters asking for help and asking for a dialog.

And then you recently talked with people from the White House.

What happened?

Well, I was pretty upset this this latest issue that we had to put it lightly.

I mean, gosh, we had 52 people dying in an 18 wheeler right here in Broward County.

And and if you go back to the first letter I wrote last fall to the White House, it talked about that very scenario that I was afraid that people would end up dying in the back of one of these 1800s.

This is not a new problem.

Right.

It's been happening for decades here in south Texas.

We're seeing an uptick in it for sure.

But I'm asking for more federal assistance.

You know, with that being said I support I support President Biden.

I'm just asking them for more federal assistance.

And you were a little frustrated after the second and third letters that you got a response.

And I was you talked to them and what what's happening now?

Well, I mean, look, I was afraid I was going to end up on some sort of Secret Service watch list as a result of these letters.

But I did get some positive feedback from the White House.

They wanted to meet we did meet via Zoom they wanted to hear what my input was.

I gave them some possible solutions from a law enforcement perspective, but also just as a regular.

Joe, here's what I'd like to see happen.

What would you like to see happen?

And how could they help with that in terms of money or resources?

I'd like to see them figure out a way to put more of these folks to work for us anyway.

You can't tell me we don't need more folks.

For example, you take your family out to dinner, you're going to wait an hour for the table because there's nobody to wait on you.

You're going to wait an hour for your food because there's nobody cooking the food.

And we got thousands of people coming across the border that would love the opportunity to do that work for us.

I'd say figure out a way to give them a permit to let them work, make sure that the employers are paying them a living wage, charge them taxes let them pay taxes so that where the naysayers don't say they're not paying taxes like the rest of us, let's put them to work.

You can't tell me that they're taking jobs from Americans.

If they were, there would be Americans waiting on those tables for school safety.

A lot of parents were concerned.

Now, especially after you've Aldi or send their kids back to school, what are you telling people and how much have you prepare offered?

I don't want to say extra, but because of what happened in your valley, how are you working together and coordinating?

Well, you've only thankfully for us here at Broward, it's served as a reminder an affirmation that we're doing the right stuff.

We're training the schools on on how to react to situations like this.

We're working with parents.

You know, we're reassuring the kids.

We're maintaining a good, strong presence around the schools.

We're doing what we need to do.

We're certainly training up our deputies, my deputies and my agency know what their level of expectation, what my level of expectations are for them in an event like you go into a school, there are a number of agencies here.

What's going to happen in terms of command, because that appeared to be the big problem there.

Well, I mean, look, if the sheriff's office is on scene, you know, my deputies know that you're a slick sleeved deputy running in the door, you're in charge, you're as sheriff as it gets at that point.

Until I show up or until somebody else in the command center.

In this case, there was a question because the police chief was inside versus outside and he thought somebody was outside.

Look, if you show up and you're wearing stars on your collar and there's nobody with more stars on their color than you, you're in charge.

You don't have to wait to be told you're in charge, especially if you're standing in the middle of a school and you're a school.

Police chief, you're in charge.

You're also working on elections coming up.

And a lot of people are concerned about voting at schools.

So some schools are going to be closed that day.

Absolutely.

What are you telling parents and kids about voting schools that day?

So I say kudos to the school district for taking that initiative.

They're closing the schools for the day.

They're making it a teacher work day.

We absolutely we we've got to have elections.

We've got to have the polling sites open.

But I'm also understanding of the parents that say, well, I'm worried there's people there that say they're going to vote, but they might not be.

I'm so I'm worried for my kid.

That's the last thing we want is to create undue alarm in the community.

So kudos to the school district and school districts that are saying look, we're going to keep the kids home that day.

The teachers are going to work.

I think that's a good call.

That's what I would love to see happen.

And we don't have a lot of time.

But you spoke before a legislative committee about several things over there, something that you want to see in the next session.

I'd like to see the T code rule on not giving a tick or license to somebody unless they're a naturalized U.S. sorry, a t t t call is the licensing agency Texas Commission on Law Enforcement.

It's where I get my peace officer license from.

It's where my my detention deputies in the jail get their detention license from.

It's where my dispatchers get licensed.

They won't give you one in the state of Texas unless you're a naturalized U.S. citizen.

However, we've got legal permanent residents that have served honorably in the military.

They're getting out.

They need a job.

We've got law enforcement shortages.

We're short on dispatchers.

Let's give them a license.

They've served their country honorably.

Let's figure out a way to get a response.

Well, at this point, the committee that I met with, it was the Urban Affairs Committee.

They were favorable, but now it's got to work its way through the process.

Filip Cortez will be carrying it for me on the state rep side.

On the Senate side, I think Jose Menendez might be carrying it for me.

And then we're going to see where it goes from there.

All right.

Well, thanks very much, Sheriff Javier Salazar.

Appreciate you coming in.

Thank you, sir.

As we are getting ready to send our kids back to school right about now, Texas teachers are also getting back into the classroom, but many of them are already thinking about leaving classrooms within a year.

In fact, a concerning new study says 70% of Texas teachers are considering seriously considering leaving the profession within a year.

And joining us is Olivia Molina, the president of the Texas State Teachers Association.

This survey you do every two years, usually you didn't even cover it a couple of years ago.

But this is a big jump from what you've seen before.

It is definitely a big jump.

You know, we we know that the job is demanding that it's a difficult but very rewarding job.

And so we've see about Tippie.

The last time it was 53% of people saying, you know, I may not be coming back, but to see it jump to 70% of our educators saying that this is going to be the last year that they are in and it's they're planning they're looking at something could take them away.

That's that's the scary thing is we've been talking about a teacher shortage a crisis for so many years and now we have 70% of our educators usually saying I just.

You asked other questions so you know a little bit about what they're concerned about.

What are the big issues that's driving them to this at least thoughts about it.

Well the teacher pay you know, we are below the national average.

We are below the national average around $7,000 more than $7,000 in the survey educators we're saying, you know, if we got a $12,000 increase, that would help out where I wouldn't have to go get another job during the summer or during the school year.

I could focus myself on being the best educated, best teacher possible and truly giving our students the best education possible.

I have to go outside and get a second job.

And some have third jobs side hustles because they have to make ends meet.

And on top of all the pressures that are being put on as a teacher, it's just getting to be again, too much.

And you talked about stress and different reasons for more stress these days.

What are some of those?

We are constantly being attacked on how we teach, on what we teach, and how we interact with our students.

Teachers will tell you that we prepare our lesson plans.

We post them for everybody to see.

There's no secret as to what happens in our classroom, but we also want to make sure that all our students feel safe in our classrooms.

And we want to make sure to have authentic conversations with them where they can ask questions.

And we don't feel like we're going to get in trouble for answering them.

The attacks on making parents feel and think that we are doing anything but the best for their children is creating a wedge between educators and parents.

That's the other thing that we saw in the survey, where we are having a bigger percentage of educators feeling that they have less support from parents and who wouldn't feel that after being attacked politically when all we want to do is teach.

And so we know that when we have a good relationship with parents, our students get the best education possible in our state.

The governor is not helping that situation.

And now you've Aldi and safety issues.

How much does that come into play with this?

Well, I'm sure that any educator will tell you that safety is an issue now.

And for the governor to have said that he's putting everything on the table after the tragedy to ensure that we are safe in school, gun reform is not on the table, gun and gun safety is not on the table.

He is again putting it back on the educators and the school districts to do more.

We cannot do something about guns in our schools that has to be outside.

That has to be by the state.

And so nothing has really changed after you.

Uvalde Outside of our schools, our schools are being made to sort of figure out how to make people feel safe when we know that the threat is outside of our schools so that we can't really change that.

And you mentioned politicians the governor.

What do you think is going to happen?

What are you pushing for in the session next year?

We are already pushing.

We've been pushing.

We talked about this crisis.

We have a vote education first campaign where we're asking not just our educators whether they're in the classroom or bus drivers, custodian, anybody in education, but our parents and our community members to vote education first and look for candidates that are truly going to support our public schools, truly going to support our students.

And then we're going to push to ensure that we fully fund our schools.

That would be a great start, ensuring that our school districts have enough resources to get dedicated educators to stay in education because they're getting adequate pay, they're being covered more in benefits and that we're bringing in more teachers into the profession in our schools.

We have less students going into education because they see all of these attacks.

They see all of these hurdles that you have as an educator.

And so ensuring that the state supports our educators, listens to our educators and doesn't just tell them what to do when they have no idea what happens in our schools.

Well, thank you very much.

We're out of time.

But some great issues you raised there.

And I know we'll hear more about them in the coming year.

Well, Vivian Molina, president of the Texas State Teachers Association, thanks for talking with us.

Thank you.

A new movie with some Hollywood stars is about to shine a spotlight on South Texas and some forgotten history here.

Now in a moment, we're going to talk with the San Antonio lawyer who wrote the book that's now a movie.

But first, I talked with some of the men that the movie is based on.

Who were fighting brutal discrimination and we were fighting poverty.

But some friends who were just teenagers back in the 1950s in Del Rio overcame incredible odds.

They became not only Texas state champions, but some then even professionals in a sport they first weren't even allowed to play golf.

We actually felt that we actually stole the game because we picked it up from and looking at other players play while we were caddying as a job.

Because they were Mexican-Americans caddying, working there was the only reason they were even allowed at a golf course in the first place.

And then very segregated border town in a very segregated Texas golf.

Was was a white man's game.

But that didn't keep them from actually playing.

When Humberto Garcia found out about their story and all the challenges they faced, he thought it was perfect material for a book he titled Mustang Miracle.

Immediately thought this is a story that needs to get out and people need to find out about what these guys did.

I sat down with Garcia and three of those caddies Gene Vasquez, Philippe Romero and Lupe Allen for News Four shortly before COVID, when they hoped it would be turned into a movie within months.

Telling stories like how they grew to love the game so much they built their own course on scrubland.

What were your greens like and were brown brown dirt?

Greens were brown dirt.

They would have one or two clubs that they would share between everybody.

They just take.

Turns.

But then their school superintendent created a high school team for them, and they were finally allowed to play at that country club where they still worked.

But only early in the morning.

Once a week, though, it turns out they had some secret advantages from their jobs and their course.

I was always observing the golfers.

You learn how to hit from each hand dirt and they turn you loose on grass.

It's just like a dream.

We built a team and we started playing and we started winning.

And they beat all the teams they were allowed to play against and won the Texas State Championship in 1957.

The top three individual medals too.

But turns out that year for some reason there was no award ceremony.

All of those things that we encountered actually helped us become stronger.

And when they got back to their segregated high school on the then poorer south side of Del Rio, they did get some recognition, even leather jackets.

But how do you think you spelled golf?

Golf?

Yeah, we had to send them back.

Yeah.

You didn't know that, did you?

You you a live golf champions got on.

But they taught themselves to play golf so well, three of them, and made a living at it.

Philippe Romero, a golf pro.

Mario Lomas a caddy on the PGA Tour, and Joe Trevino, the best who could have turned pro, decided instead to be a groundskeeper.

We all ran a lot of obstacle.

Anything possible.

And that basically is the moral of the story that it's now the movie called The Long Game.

And here to talk about it is a man who wrote the book Mustang Miracle, and who also has a part in that movie, Mr. Hollywood, now San Antonio lawyer Humberto Garcia.

Thank you very much for coming in.

And congratulations on it being turned into a movie.

Thank you.

When did you first find out about this?

This is a number of years ago.

You went to the same high school, but it was later.

Here's the irony about it.

I went to some Philly high school.

I graduated in 1972, and then when I started practicing in 79, I played golf regularly with JB Pena and even this and several others.

They never mentioned anything about the state having won the golf championship was.

A superintendent there.

The superintendent who was a coach.

I did not find out about the fact that they won the state championship in 1957 until 28.

The school alumni had a reunion and part of the reunion they had a golf tournament.

After the golf tournament was played.

We were gathered in the room and the director of the tournament just told us before we present the trophies I want to introduce to you the members of the 1957 Mustang Golf team that won the state championship.

And several of my classmates and I looked at each other and said we had a golf team in 1957 and we won the state championship why didn't we know about it.

And you're, you had written a book but not nonfiction like this and you said you had to write a book and then you pitched it to Hollywood and it's taken ten years.

It has.

I wrote it right after I began writing it, right after I found out the story about it because I knew as a story need to be told.

When it was published in 2010 I had the opportunity to go to Hollywood and pitch the story for a movie project.

To several production companies, and shortly after I made the pitch, there was one company that decided they wanted to pick up the option and that was three years of productions.

George Lopez's production.

And now who is in the movie?

Besides You?

Besides Me, the lead characters are played by J.R. Hernandez.

He plays JB Piano.

Dennis Quaid plays Frank Mitchell, the character they wrote into the script who is a friend and all more buddy of JB and JB.

The actor was in what was a Magnum P.I.. Magnum P.I.

and in conversation with him, he said he decided to take up the role because he has a connection, personal connection to Del Rio his maternal grandfather used to live in Del Rio before moving to.

California.

And I thought, it's interesting that you shot this in Colombia.

The country of Colombia and then up in Smithville in Bastrop.

That's correct.

It's because of the incentives to movie production company and.

Now when is it going to be out and who's going to distribute?

I don't know who's going to distribute it.

It could be go directly to Netflix or Amazon Prime have not found that out yet.

But it should be released in the first quarter of 20, 23.

Well, congratulations.

And you're still going to be a lawyer.

Sure.

Well, because I understand you've gotten into acting.

You get the acting bug.

I do.

Well, and I'm signing with with an agent in California who's also run by the producer who produced this film.

I think it's a great story and really shines a spotlight on what a lot of people here today don't realize happened, what life was like here for so many people.

And I think it'll be eye opening but good luck with that.

You know, get over Big Head when you get to Hollywood.

Don't forget all the little people here in South Texas.

Thanks very much, Humberto Garcia.

The movie You Want It's Out will be called The Long Game.

That's right.

Thanks.

Thank you for having me.

Plans to redevelop Broadway north of downtown are at an impasse right now because the state and the city can't agree on just how many lanes there should be.

Joining us with the latest on this is Brian Chesnut, investigative reporter, columnist for the San Antonio Express-News.

What is the latest on this?

You've been reporting on this for some time, and it was supposed to be a bond issue passed by the voters of San Antonio, where the city was going to redo it.

They had been given permission by the state, and then the state said no.

Right.

I mean, the situation currently is that they are still at an impasse, disagreeing.

It basically comes down to an argument over how many lanes they will reduce on Broadway stretching from interstate 35, all the way up to The Incarnate Word, University of the Incarnate Word.

The city wants to reduce Broadway down to four lanes so they can add wider sidewalks and protected bike lanes.

But the state, under the direction of Governor Greg Abbott, is reluctant to allow that.

They're refusing to allow that.

They say that traffic is just going to increase every year going forward and due to capacity issues that would cause too much congestion.

But this was kind of a shock to the city because they did pass a bond issue.

This city had gotten control from the state to Broadway and maintenance and all that kind of stuff.

And then the state just kind of.

Went what the state showed was that the city never technically actually took a sip of Broadway they believe they had briefly, but there was a there was a bureaucratic measure that didn't pass, and I'll spare you the boring details, but in the end, the state owns that section of Broadway.

And so now the city has been doing this section of Broadway from downtown up to I-35 just before the pigs stand there.

And that is still being worked on.

That's owned by the city.

Right.

And north of I-35, though, what does it look like?

They're going to be doing it just waiting with that bond money from 2017 already passed.

It's a holding pattern.

They are waiting for the state to get back to them.

I feel like, you know, city manager Eric Walsh is under marching orders by the voters who overwhelmingly approve this bond project to reduce the lanes, widen the sidewalks and create protected bike lanes.

But Bruce Bugg, the chairman of the Transportation Commission, which oversees Tex DOT and who was appointed by Abbott, he's under the marching orders of the governor who is very stubbornly refusing to allow the city to reduce these lanes.

So they had a meeting last week with some of the people involved.

And what happened?

Nothing nothing keeps happening.

There's no no resolution.

They cannot agree on this basic issue of space.

And now the city said that they were using the state's own data to bolster their argument.

How did that work?

Right.

Initially, the city was relying on its own traffic study that showed that it assumed that some people would get out of their cars once these sidewalks and bike lanes exist, thereby reducing some of the congestion.

The state refused to acknowledge that that would even happen.

The state's data reflects the idea that no one's going to get out of their cars going forward in the future.

So the city, the city's strategy at that point was, OK, we'll use the state's assumptions and still we'll make intersection improvements that will improve congestion, even if no one gets out of their cars.

In terms of lanes and things like that, and making lights more efficient right.

Did they get into the fact that Broadway, at least part of it, has a lot more residential housing and is more in the works up farther north?

I didn't see that as part they might have, but I didn't see that as part of the argument.

What's the sense you get of what's going to happen?

How long?

I would I've heard six months that now they're waiting to see what the state comes up with to see if the state can accomplish somehow accomplish the will of the voters from the the bond project.

While also maintaining six lanes of traffic that would probably require the city to, you know, eat into right of way that's owned by property owners.

And I don't know how that happens or how they persuade property owners to allow that.

But going forward, the city is waiting.

They're not throwing in the towel.

Are they waiting for maybe an election to be over?

I mean, this is one of those city state issues that we've had now for a number of years.

I mean, we know there's a gubernatorial election coming up.

And we also know that Abbott is the one who is behind the refusal to allow the city to do this.

All right.

Well, thanks very much, Brian Chesson of investigative reporter, columnists for the San Antonio Express-News.

Appreciate it.

And thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

You can see this show again or previous shows, as well as download the podcast, at KLRN.org And we'll see you next time.

On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho.